Yes, but he has a pop-cultured penchant for cruelty and mocking people. He's the kind of guy who walks in introducing himself as he hums Rolling Stones' Sympathy For The Devil. If anything, at least he's amusing.

@ Gaon: Yes, Dr. Thrope was inspired by Batman Returns. In fact, the very fact that all of Phantasmic's team (still unamaned as a whole, but I'm thinking the Midnight Crew given their agressive honesty about who they really are and sinister shadow based magic) all have an Animal Motif; they're all a little mentally unbalanced and dysfunctional, but it's a divine madness, the kind a Mad Oracle possesses. One of the themes I'm going for is that everyone's a little hypocritical, and awareness of that hypocrisy is a high virtue. Strige, to use a previous example, is a vampire who literally needs war to survive, and yet his knight's honor implores him to save the weak and innocent from violence, including his own comrades if they go out of control. He knows this, and his made his peace with it-there's a reason he's the Token Good Teammate.

Also, nice work with Leviathan. I assume he keeps to the sidelines, which is good if you're going for deep villains-let him be the Bigger Bad, not the main antagonist who the heroes will be primarily fighting.

Name: Grandmother Void, aka Death Disincarnate, Entropy, End-of-All, The Bringer of Rebirth, She-Who-Tends-To-Shadows, and a million others, and that's before getting to her mythological names, such as Izanami, Itzpapalotl, Nyx, Ereshkigal, Eve...

Backstory: It's impossible to pin down Grandmother Void's exact origins, since the laws of reality were literally different in the previous cosmos, and at the very least she was "born" at the exact moment of its end. What is known is that when the First Lightkeepers came into being shortly after the birth of the universe, she was already there to greet them (indeed, that's how she got the title-even if the Lightkeepers weren't born from her as they claim, she's still literally a generation older than the "parents of life"). Curious about these new things called "life" and "sapience", she tried to consume them, and managed to devour at least one (which is why she has avatars with a human-scale personality), but the Lightkeepers surprised her. Turning her own power against itself, they sealed her in the gaps between the new multiverse they were trying to create, and used her power to fuel their initial creations, knowing her compassionate nature would prevent her from simply breaking out.

Seeing as how even an omnibenevolent entity will eventually lash out if you confine her too long without even limited freedom, however, the Lightkeepers deliberately created escape hatches and flaws which she could briefly wiggle into however, allowing her enough of the taste of freedom to satisfy her. They didn't quite gauge on the ingenuity and recklessness of sapience, though; eventually, a techno-magus from a long-lost world, his curiosity matched only by his hubris, made direct mental contact with the being his people called She-Who-Tends-To-Shadows in their ancient tongue. They immediately found each other pleasing company, and he soon became the First Archon, often called by the Earth translation of his new name, Nyarlathotep Thousand-Face (yes, that one; the entire Cthulhu Mythos was the result of old Nyarly playing a rather mean joke at Lovecraft's expense). He then went on to start a long, multiversal tradition of invoking Void's name to protect all those who followed the path of Black Magic and Card Carrying Villainy everywhere, since the Grandmother's only commandment was "do as thou wilt". Indeed, almost all of the Lightkeepers' actions from then on could be considered a way to stop Void from entering thanks to her worshipers' fervor. Hell, even their classification of threats is organized like the military ranks of her forces (most Mask minions are Shadowed Corporals, Masks themselves are generally Dark Lieutenants, important ones are Nihil Captains, those who are currently controlling a world are Astral Colonels, and the Archons are the Interstellar Medium Generals, but nobody that last title it on the basis of it being rather stupid).

Which is strange, since said Card Carrying Villains also follow her example when it comes to needless cruelty (ie, they don't truck with it), and one of her teachings is "above all else, know thyself": know the flaws in your own viewpoint and practice self-examination. Self-examination usually leads to self-restraint, hence why Void cultists are so often Anti Villains, and don't necessarily conflict with being Well Intentioned Extremists (it's just a Necessarily Evil variety of Well-Intentioned). Many of them don't actually worship her either, just ask her and her free servants for favors. More than a few are even practicing members of Abrahimic and other monothestic religions, they just recognize her as a powerful entity worthy of respect if not their faith. Yes, imbalances between the Aether and Nether, often provoked by the fear and awe an Astral Colonel inspires allow her to wiggle some of her essence in, but when it comes down to it, she isn't the-or even a major-source of evil. Or sponsors all Masks, for that matter. Nor is she as gluttonous as Lightkeeper propaganda likes to suggest-she recognizes devouring something suddenly causes pain to that which is left behind, and thus she restrains her palate to things that were already dying or isolated utterly from the world.

She simply is the guide of Chaos in Order Versus Chaos, and is completely Above Good and Evil. If a true hero comes before her and petitions her for a favor, she will judge it as fairly as any other. The Void loves all, after all.

The Anti-God: In a nice inversion, it could be said that the Lightkeepers are the antithesis of her-she is a primal, singular being of darkness who supports the individual and unfettered personal freedom, while they are primal, multiple beings of light who support the group and infinite security. Both have their flaws and virtues.

Anti-Villain: As mentioned, Void is omnibenevolent, which is a really good thing for existence as her powers could easily crush entire universes with a pointed Death Glare.

Cosmic Horror Story: Ha, ha, no. Her children are pretty high on the eldritch tentacle-o-meter, and she's pretty damn Lovecraftian in her own right, but one of the things she's alien in is her ability to truly care about all of existence, to the point where it's the only real limit on her powers. She can be dangerous, but really, she's just...there. In fact, this is actually a plot point; the brutally pessimistic and Knight Templar ideology that underpins much of the cosmic horror genre is subject to a Deconstruction here, showing much of its outright fascistic undertones (humanity is naive and irredeemably corrupt, ergo we must purify it). Ultimately, if someone starts spewing something that sounds like something out of a Lovecraft novel or Warhammer40000, beware.

The Dark Arts: Their patron and power source. Which is why Masks tend to use them and not Capes-using them requires you to think like she likes you to, which is to say to look at your Jungian Shadow, at the flaws and hypocrisies in your own mind and accept the fact they are part of you. Not a lot of the "forces of Justice" can do that, while Masks are told to embrace the dark side of yourself. It's a rare individual that can do that and not break in either direction of "I never want to see it again" or "I'm not the good guy, so what?". Rare, and very brave (the latter is simply going into denial over how much the Shadow is a product of you, and instead claims the Shadow is the only part).

Dark Is Not Evil: She herself is as far from genuine evil as possible, although her cultists and many of her children don't share this trope-true omnibenevolence is impossible for anyone except her, when it comes down to it.

Dragon-in-Chief: She's both on the sidelines by default and too benevolent to really menace the world without prompting, thus the Archons tend to be this.

Expy: Of Hell from 3E Nobilis, and to a lesser extent an infinitely much nicer Chaos God, likewise for the Archons, who could just as easily be called Daemon Princes.

Informed Attribute: In-Universe: A lot of the powers attributed to her and her influence by the Lightkeepers don't actually happen, but frankly they tend to see her influence in a lot of things, especially things that aren't actually influenced by her. She's literally the perfect bogeyman for them.

Invincible Villain: What part of "omnipotent being constrained only by her personality" do you not understand? There's a reason the story doesn't focus on her and why so many people worship her.

Meaningful Rename: Part of the process of making a new Archon; she literally edits their True Name into something that reflects them better, as well as the unique powers they get from their newfound Abstract Apotheosis. To use an example from earlier, Dr. Thrope could be transformed into Trescha Fenrisdottir, amplifying her werewolf powers so that she becomes an embodiment of Nature Is Not Nice, savage, beautiful, and utterly untamable.

Multiversal Conqueror: Downplayed. Her worshipers and powers affect the entire cosmos, including other dimensions, although she doesn't want to rule or destroy it. It's why the Lightkeepers view their quest to contain her a Forever War.

Omnicidal Maniac: No, she is not. Indeed, she's actually critical to the rebirth of the world in a metaphysical context; someday, when all life is extinquished and the last black hole dissolves, she will enter the cosmos and consume it, gaining an intuitive understanding of the fabric of the universe, and using that knowledge to create a new Big Band from her essence. Indeed, her consumption is motivated by her desire to preserve the best of the world for the next cosmos.

Pure Is Not Good: She's literally Altruism, and she's feared for perfectly understandable reasons that are usually justified.

Starfish Aliens: Herself, and her direct children-each of those is a powerful beast in its own right, and in many cases quite abstract: The one the Midnight Crew deals with on a regular basis, Inspires-Satori, is a sapient internet meme who takes the form of a series of Creepypasta with a "strange man with grey eyes" somewhere in them, inspiring people to write more stories with him in them, all of which are subliminally geared towards people accepting the fact that one day, everything dies...and with hidden ciphers and puzzles explaining occult techniques and useful info for Masks within them.

The Undead: Has a lot of them on her side, hence why the Lightkeepers call her servants the Unending Legions.

Personality: Lord Bael is easily one of the most monstrous Mad Scientists, making even the likes of Albert Wesker seem small in comparison. He stumbled upon a planet of robotic beings, who had spun their flesh about Spell Cores and then set those at the center of a robotic shell. What does he do? Why, he implants himself with the "King's Core", sacrifices his entire exploration team (including his son), and becomes the unofficial ruler of the new world of Viseilia. He has a massive It's All About Me complex, and is violent almost casually. He believes he can do whatever he wants, whenever he wants, and damn the consequences. As the head general of the Jerdian Army, almost thirty years after his "trivial sacrifices", he razed an entire village, and encouraged the hero to travel and fight him, mainly because it amused him to have that kind of relation to Vonh, who reminded him of his son, encouraging trauma and disaster in the boy's life. This alone says a lot. Bael views his own subordinates as worthless and "less than dirt". He even refers to his own Dragon, Gabren, as being "an utterly annoying child." He then has the nerve - the sheer temerity - to whine that he wants his son to handle Vonh when the young hero became too problematic. His son's dead, long dead, so he kidnaps a girl who had his son's soul reincarnated into her body, forced her to take his form, wiped his memories of Bael's treachery and human sacrifice in that mission, and brainwashed his reborn son into taking on Vonh. He has a nihilistic personality that claims that no life has any intrinsic worth, and spouts off random nihilistic tangents in a pseudo-friendly manner. He is greatly confused by this idea of "love". He has experimented intensely to try to figure it out. He ripped out the heart of one of the hero's companions, who was deeply in love with a woman held captive by Bael, and examined the heart to see if he could find love in there. He couldn't, so he threw the heart away and outright told Vonh that he's so sad that he wasted his time killing his friend up close, when he could have done so from a distance. He doesn't even have any loyalty to Jerdia. He assassinated his own side's best commanders, including his own boss, just to increase the amount of carnage in the Jerdian Wars, to see if this would break the seal on "his" Viseilia.

After his demise at the end of Ends of Terra, he's reborn as a young man. In this new body, his personality is even more violent and depraved. He also seems to have failing memories as his new body and his old memories come into conflict, the personality of his new body slowly merging with his old one. While previously, he did not lie, in this body, he's a compulsive liar, and his obsession with love has taken on a new, horrifying light. He doesn't even value Viseilia any more, calling its inhabitants "callow machines" that "exist to fulfill my desires". He now creates warped frankenstein-style women to try to find someone for him to love, which takes the form of the two trying to kill each other until it sticks, one way or another. He also thinks his son is his romantic rival...in getting Vonh's attention, talking in a Blood Lusty fashion about how good it feels to fight Vonh. He seems to confuse love and hate at this point, outright at one point thinking they're the same thing.

As a child, Bael has decided to research love, hate, and power to the expense of dispensing with a large, sweeping Evil Plan. He barely remembers his life on planet Terra, except that he really, really love-hates Vonh. He views Vonh as his father figure now, and he takes Oedipus Complex to new, frightening heights. Now prone to more vibrant, alarming emotional states, and with little control of his impulses, he tends to randomly murder even people he might have needed for a small scale plan or scheme. Even though he lacks a grander plan, he is still incredibly dangerous and still has a definitive pattern. As a child, he's even more of a Mad Scientist, trying to artificially create love and hate. He is even more Blood Lust driven, calling fights "social intercourse".

Abilities: The first thing you should know about him is his Body Surf ability. It lets him go from body to body by transferring a large amount of his blood between bodies, though this frequently gives him blood poisoning and debilitates him while he reshapes and forces his body into order using magic and age old science. His main offensive ability, granted by the Oblivion Grimoire, is that he can weaponize his blood, fusing it with Mana to create deadly weapons and constructs, which, due to his Old Terran Royal Blood, count as "Blessed Weapons". He is an incredibly skilled Magician, using spells that have not been seen since Terra. These are uniformly extremely powerful. He can also put himself back together after being cut apart, but this takes the form of strings tying him together, lending the appearance of a stitched up corpse walking around.

Weaknesses: He often has weak periods, where his current body starts failing him. When this happens, he needs to partake of the flesh of vampires, and other fantastical creatures. He also tends to injure himself in long fights, and too many wounds from using his own abilities can lead to him being incapacitated as he pulls himself back together. As covered, due to his method of Body Surf, he is often poisoned by his own blood as he fuses the different types of blood using his shapeshifting powers.

Goals: That is the thing; aside from "understanding the human soul, and exacting vengeance", he has no goals. There's nothing he wants, material wise. Aside from getting his higher power levels back, he doesn't have anything else he wants but to continue his depraved research. Then again, Evil Is Petty, and he can randomly decide someone who's slighted him recently needs to suffer a lot.

Motivation: For him, it was watching the younger woman he loved go for his son rather than him. That's it. That's why he decided everyone in his expedition needed to die. And once that was done, he did nothing for any reason other than that he wanted to do it, thus, he did it.

Role in the story: Bigger Bad; on many levels, a lot of what went wrong in the backstory, and screwed up systems, plots, sinister events, and dark conspiracies can all be traced back to Bael doing something. One could go as far as saying he's the cause of everything bad that's happened ever, in the New Dawn verse.

Backstory: Lord Bael started out as a fairly normal, if somewhat paranoid scientist with a loving relationship with his son, somewhat ironically enough. During an expedition from Jerdia through a bizarre gateway, he found his way to the mechanical hell hole of Viseilia, at that time stagnant and focused supremely on order and efficiency. It was during this expedition that he grew closer to the Jerdian Royalty, Lady Amalia, who he thought could replace the empty space in his heart left from his wife's suicide. And then she chose his son Thomas over him. His paranoia, since his wife's suicide, reached a boiling point, and when he was prodded by the King's Core, he crumbled almost instantly, and in a fit of madness, killed them all as a mass human sacrifice, and merged with the King's Core, which was now completed...and stained black with his malice. Ever since then, he was on a trip upward in the Jerdian Military. Lying that he was the only survivor and he tried his best to save Lady Amalia, he preyed upon her brother's kindness, and became more and more powerful. He found his Grimoire in a temple Jerdian authorities ordered destroyed, and found out the secrets of the Grimoires, and how they related to Viseilia. Originally, Viseilia was a more predatory world, and the ancient Yorians separated Terra from the rest of the universe with a powerful spell. He decided to put that spell to an end, and began a horrifying campaign across the world, personally razing Seillarch Kingdom to the ground, murdering young Prince Vonh's family, and only barely missing the youngest prince. Yuvan, a Knight of the Order of the Blue Rose, a highly honored group within Seillarch, took the boy away and raised him. Vonh quickly proved more a thorn in Bael's side than he intended, and he derailed many complicated plans to unify the Grimoires in one place. In a fit of pique, he decided he wanted nothing to do with the problem he made for his own side, and created the Thrice Scarred Organization, forced his son into his more familiar body to lead this group, and wiped his memories, except for a desire to serve Bael, his "honorable father". Despite this, Thomas overcame the spell and joined Vonh, together with the more sympathetic members of Thrice Scarred. Maddened by this betrayal, Bael tried to lead another campaign into coalition lands, but was repulsed in severely humiliating fashion, again by Vonh. In a final battle as the coalition closed in on Bael in the Ruins of Seillarch, the darkened figure was slain in a Beam-O-War with Vonh. This, however, was not the end for him. He managed to inject his blood into Prince Vergius II of Jerdia, and hid for a time, only to reappear when Vonh was trying to rebuild the Yorian Boundary Spell, damaged by Bael's influences and search for the Grimoires. In a struggle, both men were frozen in the Lake of Clarity's water turned to enchanted ice in a desperate move by Vonh. Bael's section of the ice floated out to the Norimara Swamp, where he was forced to wait, as he was sealed by a coalition of monks, who recognized his malignant nature. He awoke during the End of Terra, namely, by a psychotic cultist and ex-Monk, who he wasted no time in slaying to prove who the real Big Bad was. Now in a body consisting of his old Vergius Body plus numerous pieces of villagers who had been drawn to his crypt by his latent darkening influence. Now a Frankenstein's Monster, he rose from his crypt, and easily defeated Vonh, though he almost fell to pieces due to fighting too hard with such a body. Even though the local Satan expy that now officially led Viseilia in causing the apocalypse was the central villain, the newly renamed "Balmunc Zwei Artensa" was the larger threat and horribly personal to all the heroes of the new age. He began a series of demented "love experiments" from the safety of the Kingsreach, an underground citadel stretching from Taldeim to Jerdia, (a massive area the size of eight full football fields), and tried to turn the preserved Sera into his Dark Messiah, his "Angel of Love and Hate". He was finally beaten after a long, torturous journey across a dying world by Vonh, the terrifying Balmunc struck down on Terra's Moon, which he had planned to turn into a massive bomb. Yes, with him still on it. He honestly thought he could survive that. Even this, though, was not the end for him. As Vonh left, he managed to bring himself back from the dead simply by the "Power of Love and the Power Of Hate". He was, though, almost slain by the journey through space on a fragment of the moon, turned to a chunk of space rock. As he landed on Earth, barely even alive, he jumped bodies one final time into a pre-teen child...

Relevant Tropes:

Berserk Button: As a young man, interrupting him when he's talking, or insinuating you find him ugly is a good way to end up with a blood spike through your chest, or an especially hideous One-Winged Angel form. And do not make him think you might be his rival for Vonh's attention. His own son got a blood tentacle through the chest, and "Don't get in my way, son of mine!!"

Bigger Bad: A lot of what went wrong in New Dawn can be traced all the way back to Balmunc doing something. Even if he's not necessarily aware it'll end in that kind of result.

Blood Lust: In all his bodies, he's rather...lusty...toward Vonh whenever they start spilling each others' blood.

Bloody Murder: Rather like a Deadman, he can control his blood, and make it do quite strange things. He can even generate large quantities of it to use in much larger displays. At one point, he makes a gigantic tree explode out of his stomach and impale the opponent on the branches.

Body Horror: He has infused a large number of Mana Crystals in his bones to keep his body from falling apart, though he's prone to tearing at the skin level, and generally looks like a stitched together corpse.

Body Surf: He can switch bodies by transferring his blood into others, and has done this so much, and used his powers to combine so many kinds of blood, that his blood is now pitch black.

Chest Burster: A self inflicted example, he can make his powers do horribly wrong things to himself and others, giving people One-Winged Angel forms they really, really do not want.

Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: He has no lasting loyalties, and betrays everyone he's ever been associated out of self preservation and need. He was even fully ready to discard Viseilia if it meant being able to get his way with Vonh.

Cloud Cuckoolander: As The Child, he is...spacey. Though a more morbid one than most, he has poor memory and attention span.

Complete Monster: One of my only ones. Almost everyone else has a Freudian Excuse that covers their horrible actions. Balmunc is the cause of most of those Freudian Excuses in some way or another. There's the mad science, the chest bursters, the disgusting attempt to make his son solve his problems...

Deadly Euphemism: For him "relocated" means stuffed into And I Must Scream tanks that immobilize you, "severing the contract" means severing your head, "discipline" means beating the crap out of his son, "Dinner" means eating someone, and "Proposition of Marriage" means murdering random people who interacted with Vonh that day.

Expy: As an older man, he comes across as one for Randall Flagg, causing the hero's problems in many guises to bring about an event that would have terrible consequences. He also mixes in traits of Yawgmoth, being overlord of a realm consisting of metallic beings, though he's more...up front...than Yawgmoth. As a young man, he's got traits in common with Relius Clover, being a completely mad scientist who disdains his son quite violently, and physically, he seems to resemble Light Yagami. As a child, he resembles a young Vonh...and his role in the story becomes more and more like that of Darkseid.

Faux Affably Evil: He is unendingly polite in everything...but not too far beneath the surface is a raging madman who will kill people for the most trivial of offenses, or for no reason at all.

Hair-Trigger Temper: Very, very prone to random furious acts, made more uncanny by the fact that he then immediately calms down, as if killing is what he needs to do to calm his temper.

Healing Factor: A horrific version, in that he regenerates either by eating people, or forcing an identical limb on to the stump. Though he can regenerate from wounds he inflicts with his Bloody Murder power very quickly.

Horror Hunger: As mentioned, to keep consistency, he needs to have a diet of magical beings. The following quote exemplifies it best:

"You see, little Missie, I've got this problem...this terrible hunger resting in my guts...that's telling me to gnash your flesh, tear you apart piece by piece, enjoy every little scrap...would you mind if I disarmed you? This body's not getting any more stable, and I feel we can talk further over dinner."

It's All About Me: He at one time killed some poor sap simply for interrupting his sentence.

Its also very telling that he constantly creates evil organizations with himself nowhere in them, just to try to get out of dealing with his own problems, and outright retreats from battles simply because he feels he doesn't want to handle them right now.

Lack of Empathy: He simply sees no reason to care if his experiments are in pain. He simply asks them if they hate him, or love him, based on what he's currently doing to them.

Laughing Mad: Very, very prone to wild, insane laughter, especially after becoming Balmunc. Usually paired with a Nightmare Face, and his eyes pulsing wildly in his head.

Mad Scientist: He does everything he does in a desire to understand human motivation, how to crush the human heart, and later, a scientific interest in what love is, and how it relates to hate. He does a lot of barbaric, Mengele style experiments with no scientific value whatsoever. They're just opinion pieces that spout off his bizarre beliefs.

Motive Rant: He does this to whoever is nearby, and liable to listen. He gets really, really pissed if you interrupt his rant.

Nightmare Face: Across the bodies, it seems as he gets younger, his facial expressions become more warped and disgusting looking. If he's not doing this, a Psychotic Smirk or a Slasher Smile, he just looks bored.

Shapeshifter Weapon: His blood can turn into literally anything, and he can psychokinetically generate enough to fit any need he has.

Shipper on Deck: A horrible, horrible example. He is not just interested in love, he wants to discover it by promoting certain relationships, and disallowing others. When he found out that Miriala's affections for Dolan were not reciprocated, he kidnaps Dolan at great cost to one of his evil organizations, and this scene happens:

Balmunc looked down at the utterlyterrified Dolan. Dolan was forced to look up at the monster he had grown up hearing stories about, the horrible thing lurking in the swamp outside town. Balmunc then grinned, "Its time for some surgery! I want to see you love Miriala, not that little punk Giry. I wonder if I can turn your love from one target, to another, with sufficiently enhanced treatment options...lets find out!"

Slasher Smile: He has a large number of...interesting...expressions. In all likelihood, his strange faces will go memetic. As he assumes a more frankenstein-inspired appearance, these become more frequent.

Straw Nihilist: He believes that life is inherently pointless, that its quick, dirty and cheap to buy. Though this is a cover to basically give him personal carte blanche to do as he pleases with everyone.

Talkative Loon: The younger he gets, the more talkative he becomes as his personalities fuse.

That Man Is Dead: "Bael...he was an older guy. Me...I'm a lotta combined experiences...a lot of dead people, suborned by this will of mine. You...you, my dearest Vonh, you can call me Balmunc now."

Time Abyss: Bael is older even than Qord, resting carefully at more than sixty five million years old.

Yandere: Eugh, so goddamned much. He had to clarify that he felt that he loved Vonh after an underling asked why he was pursuing him so devoutly. He then switched to hating him after Vonh "snubbed" him. He then went back to love.

Sounds terrifying. Why did his wife commit suicide, and what kind of relationship did they have? I can't imagine someone going from a normal loving relationship to not even knowing what love is without Applied Phlebotinum.

For other characters in the same universe, go here, here, or here. Note that the character in the first link happens to be the father of the character below.

Name: Will

Age: teenager - young adult

Personality: Very independent and brooding, and happens to have Chronic Backstabbing Disorder. Is The Determinator like his father, but not to the same extent and manifests as a steely, firm resolve rather than a passionate urge. Agrees with his father's ideals but partly disagrees with how to implement them and partly wants to make them happen independently in his own way instead of working directly with his father and staying in his shadow. He really doesn't like telling other people that his father is an Evil Overlord.

Abilities: While he does not wield the same power his father does, he does carry a boon/charm/blessing from his father that protects him (though he is loathe to use it), that is even powerful enough to summon his father to his location if necessary. Unknown to everyone (even himself) he is also a Power Nullifier who is Immune to Fate. As for his own achieved abilities, he is skilled in all sorts of weaponry and is also a very devious Manipulative Bastard at a young age.

Weaknesses: Sometimes he doesn't think his schemes through which lead to consequences he did not intend. He is also very prideful, his drive to step out of his father's shadow sometimes gets him into trouble.

Goals/Motivation: To leave his own mark on the world like his father did. Also, to help achieve his father's goal to kill the gods, Screw Destiny, and destroy the world. He intends to do this by earning the trust of their mutual enemies and then betraying them at key moments.

Backstory: Was born in the Crevasse, which is an area usually overlooked by the Dei ex Machina. When his father gained his powers, he supposedly ensured that they would be passed on genetically, and also acquired a boon that could completely override Fate only once. His father hastily used this boon to save Will's mother who was destined to die, and later Will is born without his father's powers despite his father supposedly ensuring that he would be. He considered this to be a misfortune, but nobody realizes that because Will was conceived after Will's mother was destined to die make him Immune to Fate, and the reason why he did not inherit his father's powers is because they and his Fate immunity are Mutually Exclusive Magic.

After his birth and his father's rise to Evil Overlord, Will eventually runs away from home to become a mercenary. Because he doesn't stay in one place and influences the world in more subtle ways, his Immune to Fate power goes undetected by both Seers and even the Dei ex Machina themselves until he's created a chain reaction that completely alters the universe's Sliding Scale Of Free Will Versus Fate and posed a very considerable threat to the Dei ex Machina.

Associated Tropes:

"Well Done, Son!" Guy: Inverted. Will's father is extremely proud of him, even (especially) when Will tricks and betrays him, and is also proud of him for striking it out on his own instead of trying to emulate his own success, and is even a Shipper on Deck for his own son, analyzing any actual or prospective Love Interests as "suitable breeding material". Meanwhile, Will respects his Dad but thinks he's kind of a nut (which is perfectly understandable, since he is one).

Worthy Opponent / Friendly Enemy: With his father on the occasions that they do clash. Both know that the other would never do anything to do any real harm to each other.

They were not very close, because Bael was too into his research, and he was always clueless about people's feelings, but he was more of an Absent-Minded Professor than what he became. One day, he came home and saw that she was having an affair in a moment of weakness. When she saw the sheer horror and hurt on his face, she leaped out the window in shame at herself. However, he got over it extremely quickly, to the extent that he wonders if he even loved her.

His son is actually the affair guy's son, though he doesn't know this until his ultimate turn to horrifying evil.

As for why he doesn't know what love is, he believed after his wife's suicide, that he had never seen an honest love before, with that kind of info, and he believed it had been an ongoing thing from a while ago, rather than a moment of weakness. So, after a short "scientific survey", he decided he simply didn't know what love was, and that it might not even exist in honest, pure form.

@ Your Guy: He looks like fun. An Overlord Jr. who has the "bad guy's son" thing, down to the treachery, down to an art. He sounds like I'd like to read about him. The appreciation of treachery somewhat gives me a Disgaea Demons vibe.

Name:Shani Minali◊Age: Young adult. Late teens to early 20s, same as my protagonist. Role: Secondary antagonist, but the one most responsible for the protagonist's problems. Somewhat darker grey on the morality scale. Abilities: A highly adept Caster, self-taught in hydrokinesis. Given enough water and aether to work with, she could induce a tidal wave. Backstory: Shani grew up in poverty in Arc's undercity, which has left her bitter and resentful towards a supposedly peaceful society. Noah took her in after her parents died, hoping to keep her destructive potential in check. Plan: Most of the finer details in Noah's plan were actually thought up and carried out by Shani. She'll find a coastal town with a thunderbird in residence and use her powers to flood it, forcing an evacuation. Noah's allies will move in, quarantine the town (under the guise of reconstruction), capture the bird, and harvest some power for a few weeks to use in the A/E weapon. Once they're finished, they'll set the bird loose, actually rebuild the town and lift the quarantine, then exit stage left and set up shop elsewhere before anyone finds out what went on.

Worthy Opponent: Noah's opinion of the protagonist. Aya was initially acting out of self-interest, and was entirely willing to call it a day after her own goals were accomplished. She turned back; Noah is aware of this and tries to avoid harming her because of it. Becomes a point of contention between him and Shani, who considers her merely an obstacle.

Wrong Side of the Tracks: Most of the people serving Noah. Each one has been wronged by Arc and its society in some way, and agrees with Noah's cause. Exemplified with Shani.

Noah, I like. He and the Arc scenario reminds me of a less malicious Kane. Depending on POV, he could either be a type 4 anti-hero or a type 3 anti villain, which is a good thing for White and Grey Morality like in your story (essentially heroes vs anti-villains). Shani feels like the most malicious Dark Magical Girl I've ever seen. A bit much for the archetype, but that's just my opinion on the matter. I think Black Magician Girl might be a bit more appropiate.

Character is still a beta stage process.

Name: "Fugein", also nick named "The Witch Of Storms" Note: "Fugein" is her alias name as a Dark Magical Girl. Her true name is Adria Bretin.

Personality: Cynical, short tempered, misanthropic, and possibly with an anxiety disorder. Also (given her past) understandably moderately paranoid, very quick to interpret something as being a threat against her.

Appearance: Wears a black combat dress (goes lower than her kness and is a VERY conservative piece of garb given her role in the story) with jagged bluish-white trim. That combined with her green eyes and white hair which came as the result of her powers altering the color should be a warning to the Genre Savvy as to the nature of her powers. Wields a 5 foot long red staff with jagged yellow lines running down the middle.

Abilities: Powerful caster type (note: magic is not very common, especially when science starting gaining ground, even then, its a low magic setting in terms of power) who specializes in lightning (very strong), wind (strong), cold (okay proficiency), and water (very weak). Essentially the elemental forces associated with a storm. Also very clever and creative in how she uses her powers. Eventually learns to correlate her electric powers into magnetism.

Weaknesses: While she is quite the strong ranged combatent, she's very weak in close quarters (we're talking Fire Warrior vs Khorne Berserker weak here). She might have some defenses against melee, but these can be tricked by a well placed feint. Also not very good at taking a punch either

Goals: Doesn't really have a goal in mind other than self preservation. Is more of a reactive character in terms of her behaviour.

Backstory: Fugeind was born with magical powers though they didn't manifest themselves until she was seven. Since she didn't have any one to guide her powers or give her support, she was shunned, considered a demon, and otherwise cruely mistreated for them. Much like Marona, she tried to be kind to people and use her powers for good, but no matter what she did, nothing ended well for her whether from her acts backfiring horribly or coming back to bite her somehow. Eventually, she subcame to despair, becoming the angry, sad, and deeply hurt individual she is now. Recently transferred to the protagonist's school before the start.

How she is defeated: Her final battle with the protagonists is essentially a big battle of wits with ploys, gambits, counter gambits, and diversion tactics all around. She eventually gets her greatest asset turned against her.

Notes: She becomes important for beginning to start the reconstruction of heroes aspect of the story around the end of the first half.

Boxing Lessons For Super Man: The big reason why she's a threatening antagonist. Actively studies meterology and physics (mainly practical applications relating to electricity) and gets all sorts of ideas from those studies. For example, she lowers the local air temperature to increase conducctivity, thus enhancing the power of her lightning magic. She's also capable of using an enemy's bio-electric field as a "target-lock". This however takes time to do, especially if she can't see them (like if they're taking cover or something. She also uses her own bio-electric field to create anti-melee electrical discharges, but it takes about 1 second to restore charge and can be tricked with a well placed feint. Fugeind is able capable of taking electrical energy and redirecting it at a different target, which the hero finds out the hard way when he attempts to use a long rang stun gun against her. Ironically, this trope actually gets turned against her when the heroine (a Guile Hero medic) figures it out. The hero (a Bad Ass Normal whos tactically smart rather than book smart unlike his partner) deduces the "shield" application based on his partner's advice.

Dark Magical Girl: Deconstructed. The typical heel face turn quickly healing her emotional scars is completely unrealistic. As such, she still retains her cynical views and damaged personality. Reconstructed later in how a different more loving environment sets the stage for a gradual healing process.

Dead Older Brother: Her bond with him was close. Frequently cries at night because of her loneliness as a result. Subverted, she like the hero thought she was the sole survivor of that fateful mass car crash.

Enemy Mine: Gets into this scenario with the protagonists over the heroine's younger brother. Bluntly tells them that she's doing it "because he's my friend". Afterwards, this becomes the point when the protagonists realize that they've misjudged her, what her true colors are, and try to save her (even if they have to fight her first to do it).

Generation Xerox: In many ways similar to her mother. She was a Magical Girl esque character (more of a Magic Knight style with focus on water, cold, and minor healing powers). Also seems to have inherited her taste in men. Unlike Fugein, her mother was a tomboyish, slightly ditzy Love Freak with short hair. This trope to a lesser extent also applies to the hero, see below. Made retroactively funny since her cherished Morality Pet has no idea that the girl that loves him is the daughter of the very heroine he idolizes.

Good Wings, Evil Wings: After learning to use her powers to fly, it manifests itself as energy angel wings. Of course the appearance is an illusion with the power being manipulation of electromagnitism

Heel–Face Turn: Subverted. She doesn't have an alignment change even afterward the turn. She's still cynical and mistrusting of people. She fights with her new found friends out of loyalty to them personally. She may have lost hope in her old goals, but those goals are important to them so she'll fight for their sake.

I Just Want to Have Friends: Desperately desires acceptance from people, but is so emotionally damaged from her past that she can't properly seek help.

Luke I Am Your Sister: Is the hero's younger sister. She first notices something oddly familiar about his sword style during the Enemy Mine scenario. It's the same style their mother used and slowly taught him when he was a small child as part of their bond. Her suspicions are confirmed (only to the point where a viewer could postulate a theory) when she sees him wthout his armor sometime post Heel–Face Turn, but the full reveal isn't until near the final act.

Making a Splash: Although she can use water, compared to the other elemental powers, her skill with water is very weak. Ironic given that this was her mother's specialty.

Morality Pet: Has befriended the heroine's younger brother (a Shrinking Violet nerd), who is practically the only person who doesn't judge her for her powers.

Redemption Promotion: Subverted. Competent to begin with, but her effectiveness improves more due to strong synergy with the hero's skill sets and abilties than due to the redemption.

Shadow Archetype: To the hero. He figures out that he could have easily become like her (fallen to despair, lost hope, etc) if circumstances were different. This trope is what motivates him to try to help her.

Sliding Scale of Villain Threat: Regional. Theoretically strong enough to destroy an area the size of Los Angeles if pushed too far through the use of typhoons and massive lightning storms. Thankfully she's too restrained to do something like that as it would both break her code of conduct (see below) and endanger her Morality Pet.

Stab the Salad: Played completely seriously and is infact the cause of Poor Communication Kills above. The shadows show the heroine's brother falling back as if struck by lightning. She was only trying to recharge the batteries of some of his devices with a well controlled electrical discharge. The fall back was actually because he tripped as a result of being startled by the noise intensity of the discharge.

Anti-Villainous Crush: On the heroine's younger brother (about 2 months short of turning 15), though she plans on waiting for him to be ready for a Relationship Upgrade. The heroine eventually starts to use this scenario to playfully "troll" him.

Yandere: Mild case (obsessive subtype) towards her Morality Pet. It's the people who she thinks are threatening him that are the ones that have to fear her wrath, and it ain't pretty what a pissed off DarkMagicalGirl can do. Such as impaling with a wind magic guided metal spear like object that's soaking wet, drastically lowering it's temperature (note that it still takes time for water to freeze), then zapping it with lightning. This part of her fades away over time post Heel–Face Turn as her mental state improves.

You Are Not Alone: Used to effect by the protagonists after their final battle with her in combination with apologizing for some of the harm they caused her. Yeah, I know it seems odd that an Anti-Hero (borderline type 2/3) would pull this kind of stuff. Then again, since he is a Hurting Hero who suffers from PTSD, perhaps he's the kind of person who would be best able to understand her and know what's she's going through.

Ooh, very interesting. A distinct, different take on the witch-enemy that is all too commonly the Big Bad of fantasy stories. The Fallen Hero portion of her character, in particular her fall, and how she was basically pushed, make her very, very sympathetic. All the Other Reindeer to a dark extent.

Personality: Kyrio at first appears to be an utterly wacky, incredibly embarrassing dad who is constantly getting himself into trouble, and being painfully humiliated by the female Phantom Claw employees, generally making a fool of himself at least once a day. He tends to say very strange wisdom, which is so vague and bizarre that it can barely have any relevance to what is going on, nor can it really be applied all that well. His general behavior trends toward being extremely relaxed and almost never temperamental. However, beneath this facade, there is an extremely cold, extremely cunning individual who has been calculating out a callous scheme for the last eight years. He has a tendency toward viewing regular human "Muggles" who have achieved power in the world as being "obstructive". He claims to be all for the rights and needs of the Magic Using Community, when he's really leading a group of assassins around seemingly randomly killing politicians and their affiliates. He seems to have utterly no empathy whatsoever...except for his dearly beloved son, Matthew. Indeed, while he is all too willing to sacrifice absolutely anything to achieve his goals, and go as far as turning a twelve year old child into a barely articulate "living weapon", he refuses to even consider hurting Matthew, claiming to be doing everything for his sake. And needless to say, if you even voice the thought of hurting Matthew, your lifespan is decreased to fifteen seconds from finishing your sentence, at best.

Appearance: Kyrio is a tall, dark, and very handsome young man, black hair tied back into a ponytail, and cyan eyes covered by a pair of glasses that are very prone to shining in a frightening manner. He has a wiry build, and usually wears the same kind of tuxedo that the rest of Phantom Claw goes to work in. However, he sometimes dons a long coat that has an emblem on it that marks him as the real head of Phantom Claw.

Abilities: Kyrio is one of the most powerful Illusionists on the planet, being able to create illusions so realistic, he can even make you think its a different time than it truly is. He needs to usually fix this to a single focal point to start the illusion, which as far as most people know, is his sword. This, however, is a lie he himself spread about his own abilities. He can make the focus of his illusion any point on his body, or his sword. He is a very, very accomplished magician, being able to sling around high powered spells with a sweep of his hand. Not to mention that he is one of the few swordsmen superior to Matthew. His last ability is kept very well concealed, and that is the experimental "Mana Forme". It lets him become incorporeal and dodge attacks in such a manner.

Weaknesses: His illusion power, while formidable, can be easily cancelled by touching the sheath of his katana, which is the channeling aid of his illusion spells. Other than that, he seems to dislike long fights, and usually prefers leaving to having a drag out fight with a foe, claiming its one of his weaknesses. And while his spells are big and flashy and do lots of damage, they often obscure his enemy's position. Take Crimson Flare Cannon, his main fire spell. It does heinous damage, but it also results in a huge amount of smoke and flames that obscure where his foe is.

Goals: An ideal world for magic users, when the Masquerade goes down, so that they are not discriminated against or viewed as dangerous things to be killed. Hence, he wants to get rid of people who would most likely view magic badly. And going by Book 4, he actually turned out to be kind of right about people persecuting magic users based on faith (namely, Augustus), but going about it the wrong way.

Motivation: Matthew's safety from persecution, and protecting him from things that would do him harm. And there's a lot out there that would have reason to want Matthew dead.

Role in the story: Bigger Bad (While Nebiros is the Big Bad, Kyrio is the entire reason Book 1's plot happened the way it did), and then an Anti-Villain and basically Villain of Another Story.

Backstory: Not much is actually known about Kyrio's backstory, just that he actually adopted Matthew, and let his wife train Matthew as a Mage Killer, only realizing what a monstrous thing he let happen when he saw his son's eyes. He then used his powers to seal Matthew's memories away, and faked his death by The Seer. Ever since then, he was planning out how he was going to kill a lot of politicians, representatives, and people period. Mainly because he thinks that the United States as it is now would totally intern and badly treat magic users, on a religious basis. He in particular detests the Sinister Minister Augustus, who he thinks already knows about the Magic Side, and who is drumming up fear of "witches", while using a brand of faith based spellcraft himself. Kyrio started Book II's plot by assassinating a billionaire, and accidentally driving his son to take refuge with Matthew.

Relevant Tropes:

Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: He's a one man version of this for Matthew, when in "Dad Mode". How embarrassing? Asking his son if he's "plucked the various beautiful flowers who have bloomed around him".

Archnemesis Dad: In a way; while he tries his best not to fight Matthew, the two end up coming to blows.

Badass Boast: "I do not need Phantom Claw...my own power will be sufficient to see those that plotted against my son crushed into dust."

Unlike Aizen, however, this is proven slightly wrong, and Reality outright Ensues against him. He did still manage to kill eighteen of the top NWO Officers, and clear the way for Matthew.

Big Bad: Subverted. Kyrio is far from the answer to the problem of the conspiracy of Book I and II. In fact, he is working against it the same as his son.

Curb-Stomp Battle: His preferred way of getting things done, so that enemies do not get wise on his abilities. An entire unit of bodyguards? One wave of his sword, and the slash wave dismembers them. An ex-military guy getting ready to take a last stand to protect the billionaire's eleven year old son? Half the man he used to be in ten seconds. Sharon Tate Roman, the real Big Bad of Book II and head of a New World Order conspiracy? Beaten before Matthew drew his sword in the final confrontation.

Dissonant Serenity: He never, ever freaks out over anything. Even when he's murdering someone, his expression never changes. In one of his eeriest scenes, when he's contemplating murdering a detective who is questioning him, he is just smiling amiably and discussing how good the weather is lately.

Elites Are More Glamorous: In comparison to the regular Mages, Kyrio's unit wears tuxes, use coded language, talk on awesome, high tech phones, and generally, in comparison to others, are combat pragmatists who regularly outfight everyone sent against them.

Evil Is Cool: Look at that tux and long coat, and how suave he is! Kyrio manages to make being an assassin incredibly cool and awesome.

Evil Is Sexy: He just radiates a magnetic kind of villainous allure that brings women...and some men...crawling hands and knees to his side.

Expy: Of Sosuke Aizen, mainly. Lets see, both are glasses wearing pretty men who push back their hair and take off their glasses before revealing their true positions in events, and are fond of illusions...yep. Though, unlike Aizen, he has one soft spot - his son. And anyone who hurts his son is going to discover how terrifying this man can be.

Fake Memories: One of his most terrifying abilities. He can install memories into people by tapping them with his sword's handle. He did this in backstory to get rid of Matthew's painful Mage Killer training (it did not all the way work), and in the present, to make the eleven year old heir convinced that Chris killed his father and bodyguards, and scarred him.

Hero Killer: most characters know that if Kyrio is coming after you, you run.

Implausible Fencing Powers: Oh so much. Be it slashing bullets apart, or the people shooting them, it seems Kyrio exceeds even his son's abilities.

Magnificent Bastard: He lured the Yakuza out there to California to make sure that Shuuji - Anathema's son (unknowingly on her part due to The Seer's manipulations) - was put into the crossfire, and guarantee that The Seer's Shuuji related plans all fell to pieces, and also managed to have Matthew dismantle the Demon World's plans to have Nebiros initiate the Blood Feast. And he does it all while convincing people he's a pencil pusher, and that Chris was the head of Phantom Claw and the one going around assassinating people. It is also inferred that Chris did not even know Kyrio existed, and even really thought of himself as the head of Phantom Claw.

Manipulative Bastard: He strings people's emotions along expertly well, with the most prominent example being his utterly dickish behavior to one poor guy, provoking him to greater and greater anger, getting him to do a dramatic finishing move on Kyrio...only for Kyrio to reveal he had never been fighting. The guy was swinging at air. He uses this to make his opponent fall through the Despair Event Horizon and win, thus, without even swinging his sword once.

Nebulous Evil Organization: While Phantom Claw is the "Dirty Business" section of the Esper Organization and Mage Association, it really fits this kind of mold.

Obfuscating Stupidity: Acts like a complete idiot to conceal the fact he's one of the biggest schemers in the cast.

"The Reason You Suck" Speech: Gives a very, very cruel one to the same boy he has already tried to assassinate, and in failing that, scarred him, and robbed of his father and mother.

"It would appear you have not learned anything. It does not matter what kind of car your father drove, how many countries he did business in, nor how important you, or he, are or were, be it to the world, or to each other. He is dead, simply because he would not have adapted well to the new world. And in order to permanently kill his regressive world views, I am afraid, young man, that you need to die too. Know that you lived a worthless, superficial, empty life."

Well-Intentioned Extremist: As covered, this jerk had a point about Augustus, and Book 4 and Elijah Gibbs exist to show that his means, while bad, were devoted to fighting something equally bad or perhaps even worse, going by the Green Wall Incident.

Would Hurt a Child: Would scar a child for life, slash out his eye, kill his father, mother, his guards, his best friend, would Mind Rape the same child, threaten to murder him to get him to make the report that would make people do what he needed them to do, and then would viciously, mundanely mind rape same child about his role in more than fifty deaths.

Goals: He wants to turn Planet Earth into a planet of darkness (a world where crime rules and no government can stop them.

Motivation: Revenge

Role in the story: Big Bad

Backstory: He was one of the Lost Children of Rockdale County but hopped on a boat and decided to sail to Cuba because his father, Lionel found out and made his other son, Luke the president of his company, Weapons of the Lyon (located in Toledo, Ohio). But Regis entered the Bermuda Triangle and end up on an msyterious land where everyone ages but look the same as they always do. After, a few years he finally leaves the island and heads to Toledo, Ohio to get revenge against a teenager named Creole Carver who stopped him from sending missiles at the captials of Russia, Germany, America, Britain, China, and Japan. But Regis is killed but brought back to life by a demon named Nightmare, who comes from an alternate version of Earth called Planet Darkness where crime rules. Regis is walking by a store and hears the song, Fireworks by Katy Perry while he sees a billboard for Phantom Fireworks. Which gives him the idea to become Phantom and rob banks which leads him to meet Mr.Bigshot aka Jeremy Crow, a teenager who just became a superhero after fighting villains from the Goosebumps Series by R. L. Stine. Which makes him seek revenge against him and forces him to team up with a Predator named Epson P.T. But they're both defeated and sent to the Toledo prison but they escape at different times.

Relevant Tropes: Arch-Enemy, The Chessmaster, As Long as There Is Evil, Bastard Bastard, Manipulative Bastard, The Corrupter, Card-Carrying Villain, Classic Villain, Diabolical Mastermind, Evil Is Sexy, The Casanova, Evil Laugh, Serial Killer, Super Villain, Complete Monster, Disney Villain Death, Cosmic Chess Game, Big Bad, For the Evulz, Love to Hate, Likable Villain, Lawful Evil, Sex Is Evil and I Am Horny, Slouch of Villainy, Take Over the City, Take Over the World, Wicked Cultured, Greaser Delinquent, and Evil Is Cool.

Regal is certainly a classic villain with the hunting down a teenager and wanting the world in chaos, but if your world has classic heroes it should work fine. The backstory is a bit difficult to follow, but I do like his being killed then coming back to life. It's a good catch-all for insane behavior.

Name: John Pate

Age: 88 at the beginning. (looks 30ish)

Personality: Calm and polite. A nice guy, as long as you do what he wants.

Abilities: Merlin level magic.

Weaknesses: He is physically weak; most of his power come from magical artifacts or other people.

Goals: To cut Earth off from the Nine Realms, Heaven & Hell, and any other deities/afterlife.

Backstory: Pate grew up during the Great Depression with sorcerers for parents. Though they went to a Christian church, his parents believed in the older gods and prayed to them for help. It didn't work and his father left. Pate reached the conclusion that the old gods weren't real, but God was. He became a Christian and stopped practicing magic. America got involved in World War II, he joined the USMC, and was sent to the Pacific. While there, he had another crisis of faith, ending in the rejection of religion in general. When he returned to the United States, he started reading his old spell books and found a spell to summon a demon. Not believing it would work, he cast a light version and got a demon. He was shocked. God was real and all those people had seemingly died for nothing. He forced the demon to help him find other deities, eventually finding out that most of them exist. After that he became obsessed with making everyone reject the gods and isolating humanity.

Personality: To say that the Scion of Khaos and Khaos himself are vastly different people would understate the tremendous dissonance between the Lord of Darkness and the God of it. Silmarill is a manipulative creature, a deceiver whose machinations have been going virtually since he was created. He is falsely polite and dignified, while insulting and demeaning those lower than him. He is extremely haughty and ruthless, though he's quite too clever by half when it comes to ruthless, heartless schemes. He's good at them, but not as good as he thinks he is. He commonly runs into the problem that he thinks everyone is a selfish bastard like him, and that they're all planning to advance their own places in the celestial hierarchy. Silmarill's sole good trait is how damn loyal he is to Khaos (this did not stop him from making a bid for freedom once, though). While he has a high opinion of Khaos, this doesn't extend to his worshipers, who he fears might taint his liege lord with weakness. He has some vibes of a Poisonous Friend, manipulating Khaos subtly to make him "stronger".

Abilities: Silmarill is incredibly tough, and his body is made of high grade Orichalcum mixed with Xaes-Steel, both materials which, in New Dawn, are very strong and resistant to magic (Orichalcum) and physical attacks (Xaes-Steel). Mixing them together resulted in a creature whose hide is difficult to penetrate. He is also skilled in Darkness Magic, particularly in Erebus Spell Circle Spells. This essentially gives him spells that would decay the flesh from your bones, consume you in a void of your greatest fears, or even just nuke you with a Wave Motion Gun.

Weaknesses: He has a weak point in his armor where the materials did not mix correctly, at the side of the upper body's frontal plate of armor. Otherwise, he is very weak to Sacred Mana, particularly spells that run on Faith or some variety of holy force.

Goals: His goal is very simple; fill the world with Darkness and destroy civilization. His creation by the Dark Gods resulted in this being his purpose, almost by accident (Vicelogia can be blamed for this "accident").

Motivation: He was just created to do that. He even tells people its nothing personal; he just really wants to destroy the world.

Role in the story: Big Bad Wannabe (whenever he appears, he gets upstaged. Its a rule at this point.)

Backstory: Silmarill was created by Khaos, Vicelogia, Zayufur and Shiryu, mainly to function as Khaos' scion, a Scion above the other Dark Scions, and their main agent. However, due to meddling by Vicelogia, he became a horrible, twisted creature. While diabolical and intelligent, he is a haughty being that believes himself above most others. He always hated humanity for having the ability to choose their purpose. After about a thousand years of existence, he started one of his more ambitious plans. About another thousand years later, the right political and cultural elements had presented themselves for his plan, and he began trying to pre-emptively eliminate the Caesar Blood-Line. He failed in this, and was actually almost punched out later by Julius himself. This would be the closest in a while anyone came to killing Silmarill. Silmarill then appears in New Dawn proper, and makes his grand entrance by almost killing Matthew, abducting Alina, and taking on quite a few characters at once. He was, however, then displaced by Aleina and her quest for the Branch of Concordance.

Relevant Tropes:

A God Am I: Despite only being a Scion, he has a tremendous God Complex.

Artifact of Death: He created the Black Concordat Bracelet, which, in any hand but his, causes its user to turn into a mindless monster. He really likes handing this thing out to irresponsible hands.

Big Bad Wannabe: Despite being, at many times, the cause of a lot of trouble, he is rarely the answer to the problems that ensue.

Casting a Shadow: His magical preference is darkness spells, either the common variety or the more rare Erebus Spells.

Limit Break: His ultimate spell is called Screaming of Hell , which draws the foe into a deep, dark void where he turns their internal struggles, sins, fears and negative traits into a force that usually rips his foes into tiny pieces.

Reisal: Turns him from a conflicted, very teenage boy in an amoral society, who was expected to marry his sister, into a Knight Templar who was willing to kill anyone who got in the way of his love. Reisal dies as a result of Silmarill's corruption.

Lina-Ria: One of the stranger love interests of Matthew, he turns her from a strange girl with a ditzy personality to a jealous Yandere who tried to murder Matthew for going out with another person. She almost dies.

Faux Affably Evil: Utterly vicious villain, but he seems rather polite and subservient when speaking of things. It just means he'll be polite in threatening to murder you and germane when insulting you and the things you value.

Giant Enemy Crab: Okay, the demonic knight upper body is scary and all, with the Multi-Armed and Dangerous going on, the twin scythes called "Death" and "War", and his twin swords "Famine" and "Pestilence", but really, he becomes vastly less able to be taken seriously when he stops floating...and reveals he has six crab legs.

His Story Repeats Itself: Every single time Silmarill is summoned, he does the same things; he disobeys his summoner, kills people, and tries to destroy civilization. He is actually incredibly predictable in this manner.

Karmic Death: While Disney Death's and or being sealed away, every time he's defeated, and he's defeated a lot, its in a very karmic way, despite him protesting that this cannot be. Being defeated by your own Relic? Really, Silmarill?

Kick the Dog: His single most reprehensible act in New Dawn proper was giving the above Artifact of Death to a sickly young man journeying to save his sister, and telling him it would save her. He then made the guy kill his sister with his own hands, and then have him offer up even more of his life force to save her life, and ensure he would only live a few more weeks due to the stress. Why? He saw no reason not to.

Meaningful Name: A Subversion. Silmarill was named for the Silmarillion, which Khaos found out about due to Vicelogia, the Dark God of Knowledge, Time and the Void. He probably wanted Silmarill to be more like one of the Silmarillion's heroes, rather than Sauron...

Politically Incorrect Villain: Its very subtle, and nowhere near as out there as Elijah or Old Matthew, but listen to the way he speaks about some people - when Reiji brings up Chelsea Manning, Silmarill says; "I believe his name was Bradley Manning. Please do not misname individuals, Reiji. As far as I can tell, it is really very rude." Reiji tries to object, but Silmarill tells him basically to shut up and either refer to "him" as Silmarill does, or "things can become unpleasant."

Puny Earthlings: His opinion of humans. Its bitten him in the ass quite a few times now.

Smug Snake: While high functioning, ultimately, his actual abilities are nowhere near as high as he'd like you to believe.

Villain Decay: Played with; he's exactly as badass as he is when he starts his appearances, namely, grabbing one of Matthew's summoned swords in one hand, and then blasting him into a building. Key words being "exactly as badass". Which means he forgot to level grind, resulting in a lot of humiliating defeats later on.

First question that presents itself is, how does he spend his spare time? His scheme came about when he was a thousand years old. Okay, but what did he do between the ages of 1 and 1000? The elements necessary for the scheme didn't fall into place until he was two thousand. What did he do between the ages of 1001 and 2000?

I guess 5,078 is how old he was when he first appears in the story. What did he do in the intervening 3078 years?

Also Meaningful Name looks like a subversion to me. If Khaos was actively trying to evoke the heroes of the Silmarillion, and it doesn't pan out that way, that's a subversion.

From 1 to 1000, he basically spent his time fighting the Light Forces.

From 1001 to 2000, he spends his spare time basically scheming, lording his position over the other Dark Scions, and causing numerous bad events.

After Caesar basically shut him down, he spent the first half of the intervening 3078 years sealed away, and the second half after being unsealed, he basically returned, smacked around the other Dark Scions for not helping him avoid being sealed (it was really his own damn fault), and then trying to attain revenge on Caesar's descendants, while also planning out how he intended to change the way the War was going (it was currently a stalemate).

For this Screaming of Hell thing, what sort of requirements are needed to cast it? Because Limit Break isn't just "Ultimately Epic Spell of Doom!!!! it's an attack that has prerequisites that need to be met in battle before use.

With his traits as the Wild Card and the Blue And Orange Morality, it seems that this guy is gonna be something else in the work.

Now, I've already submitted two of the Bigger Bad's of New Dawn-verse, now here's the third and final guy.

Name: Vicelogia

Age: ten thousand six hundred and sixteen. Looks about in his twenties, though its hard to tell.

Personality: Vicelogia is a "completely emotionless being", which is to say that when he ascended to become the Dark God of Knowledge, Time and the Void, he discarded all of his emotions. Whenever he speaks, it is in a completely emotionless monotone, ala HAL 9000. Vicelogia plays the A God Am I belief completely straight, believing that since he is a God, he can do whatever he wants, and whenever he wants, and that his goals are justified by them being his goals. Completely unfettered by anything resembling empathy or concern or even the most basic respect for life, he toys with people for his own benefit. He claims that everything he does is for Khaos' own sake, and ending the war. However, this includes some utterly monstrous actions, including manipulating Sharon Tate Roman into her fall, simply so that he could use her as one of his pawns, which entailed infecting her family with the completely disgusting Black-Blood Plague, and then sparing her. He has a certain fondness for Mind Rape, viewing it as "a much better way to fight". Whenever he does something utterly dreadful to defeat someone without lifting a finger, he always insists that they should be thanking him for not killing them outright, and that "being touched by the mind of a God is gift enough". And safe to say, he could not care less that his manipulation of Khaos in the aftermath of Belliana's kidnapping by Zeufonis resulted in, oh, the vast majority of the problems afflicting my 'verse. He damn well knows that his ambition basically caused almost everything in the present day to go wrong...but as stated, he simply doesn't care. He acts incredibly abusive toward Reiji, his Dark Scion; encouraging Silmarill to bully him into helping with plans, calling Reiji "spectacularly useless and spineless" right to his face, and outright calling him "it" because Reiji wasn't as heartless as he wanted him to be. One of his very few redeeming traits is his relationship with his worshipers, and even that has hints of him being an utter bastard. He grants their wishes to the letter. One of them wished for a cadre of rich bullies to be "taken down". Vicelogia turned them immortal, and threw them to the bottom of the sea.

Abilities: Vicelogia's abilities are mostly derived from his "Void" characteristic, which lets him use Spatial Magic, which lets him move things, shove things, block things, and store people in miniature dimensions, wherein nobody can hear your voice and you cannot leave unless Vicelogia lets you. As the Dark God of Knowledge, he knows every single Elemental Spell, with the sole exception to his knowledge being Weapon Based Spells and Sacred Mana Spells. As the Dark God of Time, he can pull a Dio Brando and simply stop time. A sufficiently powerful individual can break his Time Stop, though. He can also pull on "ceased existences" from the past, and fuse them with his Relics, and create Geigs that function as emotional blackmail.

Weaknesses: Vicelogia's arrogance is always the thing that gets the best of him. As soon as he's winning, he'll start to banter and rant, and give away a key fact. And it seems he really doesn't understand that not everyone is a ruthless bastard like him. He honestly thinks humanity at large would really like to continue war and destruction.

Goals: He wants to end Khaos' War, and then he could "kill the woman that made Lord Khaos so disgustingly soft."

Motivation: He simply hates emotion, and every mortal who possesses it. While he claims to want to protect the Status Quo, its not out of a concern for human life, its because he doesn't think its any mere mortal's place to change "what is, and what should be".

Backstory: Vicelogia is one of the oldest Gods, being known prior to his ascension as a stoic, but caring hero. However, in the war with the Old Gods, he lost many things, and when he ascended to the pantheon, he willingly discarded his emotions in order to escape the unending pain they had brought him. He became known quickly as one of the craftiest and most deceitful Gods. His manipulations stretch far, and its implied at the end of Book I of New Dawn that he was the one who gave Nebiros the information that a Blood Feast could be in the cards soon. While putting up a facade of being a scholarly deity, he is actually responsible for a number of schemes to try to be rid of the other Gods so he could rule alone, and make Earth a place of "unending learning". This is a very, very, very bad thing. As in, it would compare in devastation to the summoning of Cthulhu in the Cthulhu Mythos.

Relevant Tropes:

Affably Evil: Until he loses, anyway, but he projects a very cool, calm demeanor, even disparaging others from cursing near him.

Because Destiny Says So: He believes that, at this point, all things are predestined, and thus pursues really dark goals because they happen to be "inevitable".

The Chessmaster: plays events and people like toys. Note that he is the Dark God that planned out the Nebiros events, the Sharon Tate Roman events, and the absolute mess of book 3 and 4. See Gambit Roulette. Everyone is ultimately just a pawn to him, and he uses the analogy a lot.

Gambit Roulette: Very often falls back on being the Dark God of Knowledge in order to make utterly ridiculous, circuitous plans that, due to his Knowledge, usually work.

In-Series Nickname: Plate-Face, for the dark steel plate attached to his face, covering his left eye and the majority of that side of his face, except the mouth. He is also called "Loggy" by Zayufur.

Kick the Dog: For a guy proud of the fact he has no emotions, he seems to certainly have "Spite" down. There was really no reason to basically use a psychic mind implant equivalent of the Chapter Black on Wes. He had won. He had done everything his Adherent had called upon him to do. All of Wes' friends were at the bottom of the sea.

Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Played with; he knows a lot, being the Dark God of Knowledge. Comprehending what he knows, on the other hand, is a different story.

Laser Blade: Il Demise, his signature weapon. It apparently can cut through anything.

Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Either way you translate his name, it could mean bad things. Vice means sin, evil or excess. Logia means Knowledge. Basically "Dark Knowledge". Vice could also be translated to "White", which looks harmless...unless you're Japanese, because White is very close in characters to Death. So "Death / Deathly Knowledge".

Puny Earthlings: Not as active about it as Silmarill, but the vibes are still there. He actually combines it with Because Destiny Says So to the effect that he believes humans have absolutely no right to change the way the world works simply because they weren't born for that role.

Shout-Out: His personal dimension has a lot of Lovecraftian Vibes. His main minions are called Mind Melters, and resemble giant floating brains with numerous TV's sticking out of them, and claws connected to wings.

The Stoic: The most stoic of the Dark Gods...normally. He claims that "knowledge is impartial. Facts are neutral. Fate is fate. Simply accept your ends with dignity and grace, when they come to you."

Straw Vulcan: To a dark, horrid extent. He abhors humans for having emotions. He even denies being spiteful, even after doing something bad.

Tome of Eldritch Lore: His most well known Relic, the Necromicon, is a tome consisting of the most deadly spells in existence.

Villainous Breakdown: Contrasting his usually calm demeanor, he is a very, very sore loser when its not in The Plan. When he's getting thrown around by a vastly improved party (the same one he once thoroughly trounced) in one RP, he audibly raises his voice, saying that its impossible for him to lose. That he's "a gift of knowledge, a gift...an endless gift to this worthless, shitty world!" Note, Vicelogia doesn't curse normally...and he then tried to blow up their home worlds.

Granted, raising his voice is the equivalent of screaming for him. That is really the limit of his emotions.

White Hair, Black Heart: Has chalk white hair, almost albine, milky skin and is one of the single most heartless bastards in canon.

Hmm, seems like a very hateable villain. This sounds like the kind of guy that will get the entire audience cheering when he finally gets his face punched in by the hero (assuming that happens). On the other hand, he also has a slightly empathetic side due to his Dark and Troubled Past. If that part of it could be played up, I'd recommend it. Not sure what else to say about him, if anything needs to be said at all. Oh, something I found kinda confusing while reading him was all the reference to other aspects of the world and other characters and magic and stuff like that. Without context, it's kinda meaningless to me. Otherwise I might be able to provide a more in-depth critique. Overall, though, I like it. He's scary (terrifying, even), he's big, he's bad, he's flawed, and I REALLY want to see him get his face punched in.

Regarding Kan, the King's Blade: I'm not entirely sure he qualifies as a villain. He seems more like The Dragon. Without goals of his own, or a more defined past, he's not very interesting. He's just kinda there. If you want to develop him more (which you don't necessarily have to do, if he's not the focus of your story's conflict), I think you should try to flesh out some backstory for him and figure out why he seems so apathetic toward the rest of the world and yet so devoted to Eden. Play up that angle.

Alright, now it's my turn! For your critique, I offer the villain of my D&D campaign:

Name: The Iron Maiden

Personality: The Iron Maiden is very stoic (mute, in fact), so it will be difficult for the player characters to glean any personality at first. Beneath a seemingly emotionless exterior lies a heart filled with anguish, and from that anguish spawns rage. The Iron Maiden thinks rationally and carefully, and acts accordingly, but everything it does is motivated by that rage.

Abilities: The Iron Maiden is a golem, a 12-foot-tall automaton made of iron. Accordingly, it is very strong and durable. On top of that, it is also a highly skilled soldier and commander, leading a small army of other golems. Its weapon of choice is an improvised blunderbuss made from a stolen cannon and fixed with a bayonet. As such, it is very dangerous in a fight, especially when accompanied by its personal guard.

Weaknesses: While it is strong, it's not invincible. In fact, it is somewhat weaker than other boss monsters of its level. It makes up for that with its personal guard. Aside from that, I've left some openings for the players to take advantage of its emotional side, possibly to provoke it into some kind of foolish action or to throw it off its game.

Goals: The short version is that it wants to kill all the humans. It doesn't really have any kind of plan for what to do afterward. It just wants to kill humans.

Motivation: It, like any other golem, was created to be a slave. Golems are created by summoning an "animating spark" from a place called the Elemental Chaos. The Iron Maiden his haunted by vague, foggy visions of the Elemental Chaos that may in fact be memories of a previous life, a life that was robbed from it by the humans that created it.

Role in the story: It is the Big Bad and, to a certain extent, the Man Behind the Man. It and its army are going to raid villages and stir up conflicts between various nations to destabilize the continent. Then, while everyone else is fighting, it and its army will swoop in and start exterminating. That is, unless the heroes have anything to say about it.

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